demi-tasse flowers

[Katy Noelle]

Hi Katy

I like reading your reflections on your work, your objectives & a running commentary on your progress. Very brave. I too keep thinking about 'artistic' & what that might mean. I think it's the relationships between skill - application of technicalities - & expression of emotion interacting with perceptions & emotions of viewers. Then when you make an expression of a universal feeling/hope/experience/whatever you've hit it.

Cheers
Nihia

This is wonderfully put!!! Thanks for the encouragement and ideas, too! Good thoughts!

[Peter Ryan]

Hi Katy,

I wrote the following before reading any of the other comments and most has been covered but since I had penned the comments I thought I might as well include them.

Hi Katy,

I don’t we ever stop working on composition but working the subject, reviewing and reviewing again and again helps to pre-visualise a shot when it appears in front of you.

I am sorry to say I do not like any of them but #4 & 5 are the cleanest but not necessarily the best, as I find the blue and white striped table cloth distracting in the others. The human eye searches out two things in an image – the brightest spot and the sharpest spot.

You know me by now, I am not prepared to just say I do or don’t like something without trying to explain what I mean. Some thoughts on the composition only.

#1 – the sharpest things and I assume the main subject, the flowers, and they are all stuck up in the left hand corner. They are leaning away from the centre of the image so the negative space is not brought into play and just hangs there.

#2 – The main subject is an unopened bud that just does not do it for me although the balance of the image is better with the flowers leaning into the space and actually filling more of the frame.

#3 – This is better still and probably the best of all the images although the small bit of table cloth is distracting but more flowers are sharp and filling the image. Now I know what I am looking at.

#4 – I am not sure what the subject is – the flowers or the cup/handle.

#5 – I assume that cup is the subject as it fills 60% of the frame but it is out of focus. The only bit in focus is the flowers stuck up in the right hand corner and then the largest one is hitting the side of the frame.